Stabbing at Binghamton University kills professor

Richard Antoun, a professor of anthropology at Binghamton University in Vestal, N.Y., was fatally stabbed by a student on Dec. 4. He was 77.

Antoun was stabbed four times with a six-inch kitchen knife inside a science building on campus. He was immediately rushed to the Wilson Hospital in nearby Johnson City and died of his injuries shortly thereafter.

Police captured a suspect, a Binghamton graduate student named Abdulsalam al-Zahrani, who immediately confessed to the crime.

“Yeah, I just stabbed him,” al-Zahrani is reported to have told police upon being questioned. Police do not yet know the motive but immediately dispelled the prevailing theory of the stabbing being a hate crime or religiously motivated.

“There is no indication of religious or ethnic motivation,” said Gerald Mollen, the district attorney of Broome county. Both al-Zahrani and Antoun were scholars of Middle Eastern religions.

Gates Foundation gives $12.9 million in grants to community colleges

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced last week that, as part of a program to increase the number of U.S. citizens with postsecondary degrees, they would donate $12.9 million to community colleges “to advance the role of technology at community colleges beyond online courses,” according to the press release.

The Global Skills for College Completion fund, which uses a web of 26 teachers in 16 states to teach basic math and writing skills, received $3.6 million to innovate uses for Web 2.0 in their curricula.

The Monterey Institute for Technology and Education received the largest sum, $5 million, to develop course materials that would decrease the number of adults who do not have sufficient math classes to be accepted at postsecondary schools. These materials would be available online.

Also receiving funds were Carnegie Mellon University for their Community College Open Learning Initiative, which received $2.5 million for Web-based programs to teach “gatekeeper” courses, and the National Center for Academic Transformation, which received $1.8 million to continue programs that redesign math courses to be more effective.

Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio heckled by song at Arizona State

During a First-Amendment forum at Arizona State University’s Cronkite School of Journalism, Sheriff Joe Arpaio was heckled off the stage by a group of pro-immigration students singing a pro-immigration song to the tune of Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody.”

Arpaio, or “Sheriff Joe” as he’s more colloquially known, is a controversial figure, known for his heated tirades and sharp crackdowns on immigration in Arizona as well as his less-than-friendly attitude toward the press.

“People are criminalized,” said the lyricist of the parody, a student who would only give “Stacy” as her name. “They are illegal because they are intentionally criminalized. Arpaio gets plenty of airtime. And this point of view does not.”

The song caused both Arpaio and the panel of professors who had been asking him questions to leave the event, ending it 15 minutes early.

Reach columnist Morgan Gard at news@dailyuw.com.